For more information on MaceTech Options Analysis…
MaceTech Options Analysis may be readily applied in a wide range of option focus areas, including:
MaceTech Options Analysis can be readily applied to a range of competitive products or services to show differences in the makeup of appeal, and reveal:
Options Analysis can apply across any collection of options so long as the options may be regarded as consisting of alternatives for a choice. This will commonly mean that the options share a context of some kind, such as a particular product or service category, a public or individual problem area, situation, or issue, or a specific political campaign.
Within the Excel program, both options and respondent sub-groups can be readily filtered and subjected to separate Options Analysis to reveal variations in option advantage, disadvantage and share from the norm.
Automated filtering is provided for analysis of each option's impacts on the remaining options. In this way each option's sources of share and impacts on advantage and disadvantage can be identified.
For analysis of new or variant products or services involving attribute changes, you can measure the appeal of each of new or variant option and assess them against the alternative options.
One simplifying approach is to use a "standard" or "model" option scenario around which variants are created and appeal measured.
Measuring variant options, rather than just attributes, is a holistic approach incorporating and measuring all modifying effects including interactions and synergies between the underlying option and attribute modifications.
A standard or model base with variant options may be rotated through a series of Options Analysis, each including an alternative modified option. The results for the analysis series can then be compared for differences in advantage, disadvantage and share. This will reveal both the extent and sources of change and show which of the new or variant options may fit development objectives.
You can also analyse any standard and variant options, in turn, against the set of alternative competing options. In this way, the specific effects of modified options on each of the competing alternatives can be assessed.
Such analysis of variants is simple and straightforward. Such variant testing is sufficiently straightforward to be readily incorporated into on-going tracking or monitoring studies.
Options Analysis can be readily applied to the analysis of standings amongst brands, institutions and images e.g. electronic goods brands, insurance companies, charities. And just as for goods and services, the analysis will reveal the scale and sources of advantage, disadvantage and share. The only difference is that the analysis of share is for preference rather than choice intentions.
To establish the effect of a brand or institution on a specific choice option, you can introduce the brand or institution as a variant of a product or service offering as described in the section on product and service variants .
Just as readily you could associate a range of products or services with a brand and evaluate their impacts on perceptions of brand appeal.
Through the application of Options Analysis the professional analyst can obtain a deeper appreciation of both current status and dynamic change relationships amongst candidates and parties. Measurement of appeal and its subsequent analysis is the key. For example:
An important but somewhat different range of applications for Options Analysis involves the rating and selection of options on the plans or activities of government, public or private bodies or the behaviour of individuals. Commonly, but not always, the options here refer to hypothetical avenues of possible change which would be acted on by institutions. The selections here would be seen as preferences rather than choice for personal action. Examples include:
Options Analysis can play an important role in surveys on such topics in distinguishing the weight of appeal from the weight of "votes". For example, two options (having a similar underlying appeal) and commanding the combined majority of choice, can lose out to a third option with contrasting appeal obtaining more "votes" than either of the others.
Such situations are potentially subject to intentional or unavoidable manipulation. To circumvent this problem there may be an attempt to reduce options to a mutually exclusive set. But this makes it difficult to explore variants around the position of each option some of which may have a substantial impact on both appeal and preference.
An important element of Options Analysis is its ability to analyse both overall appeal and its component contributions. This shows the degree to which options are similar or contrasting and the impacts of those differences. For example. Options Analysis may reveal that two options, known to differ greatly in cost, may be very similar in appeal. Since cost may not be a key consideration to the individual but a major consideration to the supplier this may be a reasonable ground for selecting a more economical but less preferred option in the knowledge that it is only slightly less appealing.
Introduction to MaceTech Options Analysis fundamentals